


The Things That Matter

by Artemis1000



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Angst, Blue Hawke (Dragon Age), Character Study, Complicated Relationships, Emotional Constipation, Established Relationship, Introspection, M/M, POV Fenris (Dragon Age), Relationship Reveal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-11-27 17:47:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20952392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/pseuds/Artemis1000
Summary: Fenris knew they were running out of time.The thing between Anders and him existed in this space of unnamed, undefined things, never palatable but at least forgivable as long as they didn’t have to acknowledge that it existed at all.When their friends catch on to their budding certainly-not-a-romance, Anders and Fenris have to deal with the realities of what has been growing between them - unsurprisingly, they don't know how to deal with it gracefully.





	The Things That Matter

**Author's Note:**

> Written to the prompt of "another person slowly realizes that the ship is together and it changes everything."

Fenris knew they were running out of time.

The _thing_ between Anders and him existed in this space of unnamed, undefined things, never palatable but at least forgivable as long as they didn’t have to acknowledge that it existed at all.

They had always known it wouldn’t survive scrutiny – that they wouldn’t even let it come to that, would deny their tentative understanding to their dying breath if it ever came to that.

Now Fenris could hear the clock ticking.

It was in the knowing grins Isabela exchanged with Varric whenever Anders and he were arguing – and whatever they may be thinking, these arguments were as real as ever. The mage was still the most infuriating person in all of Thedas, it was just that Fenris now knew there was more to him than the sides Fenris loathed. It didn’t make their disagreements any less heated, just made it even more frustrating when Anders brushed him off as if none of his experiences mattered. Anders, in turn, had grown more indignant when Fenris refused to listen to his mage rights diatribes; sometimes he even had the gall to act like it was a personal betrayal. Yet it didn’t change the knowing looks and grins of their friends, who had always far too easily dismissed their genuine grievances as amusing banter.

It was in the way Hawke grew hesitant when the topic of Anders came up, looking at him with hopeful concern, biting her lip as she fought down the desire to ask. She would ask, Fenris knew. He was almost certain it would be her bringing it up in the end, for Hawke was his best friend and she believed that friendships were built on honesty. Sometimes it was hard not to resent her for something she hadn’t even done yet.

He knew they were running out of time.

There would be no more peaceful evenings in front of the fire; Anders reading out loud while Fenris sharpened his greatsword. No more waking up with his face buried in golden hair, or a healer’s gentle hands mapping the scars on his body while they remained so painstakingly mindful to avoid his lyrium markings. There were many things he would lose and with the experience of one familiar with loss, Fenris knew most of the things he would miss most were things he wouldn’t even know to appreciate until they were gone.

It wasn’t supposed to mean anything, this nameless thing between them. He certainly wasn’t supposed to mourn it, least of all before he had even lost it.

Yet he knew: they were running out of time.

“So. I’ve been wondering for a while. Is there anything…?” Hawke wiggled her eyebrows.

Fenris stiffened. It was just the two of them walking through Darktown after Hawke had dragged him along to deliver supplies to Anders. Maybe he should have protested more but he had been glad for the excuse to check on Anders without checking on him. He’d had a hard time on their last trip to the Wounded Coast and hadn’t been to the last Wicked Grace night.

“No.”

Hawke was chewing on her bottom lip again. She looked like she had a thousand questions but didn’t ask a single one – there was a reason they were friends. She also looked like she didn’t buy his curt denial for a second – after all, they were friends.

He was reasonably sure Hawke would respect his refusal to speak about it but the damage was done – he would know that she knew. Chances were, the next one to ask wouldn’t be so easily silenced, either.

And most damning of all: he would know. He would wonder if Hawke thought less of him now, if she thought him a hypocrite every time he spoke of his past or voiced concern about magic. Then he would wonder if he _was_ a hypocrite – except he had been wondering about that ever since the first time he caught himself being so furious with Anders that he wanted to drown his obnoxious nattering in a kiss.

They had reached the rickety elevator, he knew they would be parting ways once they reached Lowtown.

“He’s a mage,” he said, as if this explained everything.

The mage at his side arched her brows. “Of course,” she answered, and said no more.

He gritted his teeth. Sometimes he wished Hawke could be just a little bit less supportive. It would be easier if he could be angry with her.

They parted ways in Lowtown, as he had known they would. Fenris made it halfway up the stairs to Hightown before he turned around.

As a rule, he didn’t visit Anders in the clinic during opening hours. He didn’t now, either. Neither of them was keen to have people gossiping about Anders's frequent visitor.

He paced the grimy alleys of Darktown, glowering at all too adventurous thieves and sending them skittering back into the darkness until he could be certain nobody would notice his visit.

As he paced, he had to accept the truth: they were running out of time but he wasn’t ready to be done yet.

In the end, all it took to undo their tentative balance was a night of Wicked Grace and a few too many drinks.

He didn’t even know who brought it up first; one moment Hawke was telling him about gift shopping for Carver, in the next, there was a commotion at the other end of the table and Anders’s chair toppled to the ground as he leaped to his feet. He stood, pale and tense in that way Fenris had come to read as more stricken than furious, though he did a good job of pretending otherwise.

Fenris hid his concern behind a scowl. “What is it now, mage?” he scoffed, mindful to sound bored.

Anders looked at him, his jaw working, yet he didn’t seem to find any words. That had to be a miracle in itself, the mage was rarely stunned into silence – and just six months ago, Fenris would have been free to gloat. Now he took in the tightness around Anders’s eyes and quietly fretted about the cause instead of searching for cracks of blue or reaching for his blade.

“Oh!” Merrill gasped, looking in wide-eyed delight from Fenris to Anders and back again. “Isabela is right! You make a very cute couple!”

Fenris froze. His thoughts ground to a halt, replaced by blind panic. His stomach felt like it was twisting itself into knots.

Anders stiffened further and turned his head away.

The walls of Varric’s suite were closing in.

Now it was Fenris who stood abruptly – he suddenly knew exactly why Anders had reacted as he did.

“Fenris…” Anders’s voice was tight.

Fenris found himself wishing he hadn’t spoken at all. He shook his head. All their friends were watching – maybe not unkindly, maybe even fondly amused but their eyes still burned into him. “Don’t,” he said and was suddenly thrown back to the conversation with Hawke. Then, he had been able to quell it. Now?

Anders took half a step towards him before he faltered.

Fenris didn’t give him the chance to gather his courage.

He fled.

In his defense, Fenris made it halfway to Hightown before Anders caught up to him.

To his shame, that was pathetic enough, considering he had years of experience always staying a step ahead of his pursuers while Anders… Well. Never mind that. He shook off that disturbing thought, for the last thing he needed to think about right now were their similarities, and focused on glaring at Anders, whose fingers remained wrapped around his wrist.

“If you don’t want to lose your hand, mage…”

“I’m rather fond of it, actually,” Anders said, his tone light and his eyes tense. He didn’t withdraw his hand. “I think that was it with our chance to deny everything,” he went on, as if they weren’t standing in the middle of a staircase to Hightown and providing free entertainment for Kirkwall’s nighttime crowd.

Fenris yanked his hand back. He cradled his wrist against his chest, though Anders’s touch hadn’t hurt. He still didn’t like being touched – except when he did – but somewhere along the way, his traitorous mind had come to think of Anders’s touch as something that promised pleasure instead of pain. It should have disturbed him more than it did, maybe.

Belatedly remembering Anders’s accusation, he shot a half-hearted, “that’s on you,” at him, and turned to keep climbing the stairs.

“Is it so terrible?” he asked quietly. “For people to know you’re sleeping with a mage?”

He was just walking at Fenris’s side now, as dog-headed stubborn as he always was – in everything that mattered to him, anyway, a trait Fenris could find admirable even though he disagreed with his choice of causes. He had never expected it to apply to him.

Fenris chose to tune him out or pretend so anyway. He knew Anders knew he wasn’t, and Anders knew that he knew. His hands balled into fists at his sides. They had always played games like that. The stakes just didn’t use to be quite so personal.

“Really, Fenris?” The affectation of good humor was completely gone now, leaving Anders sounding just tense and overwrought, a lot like he sounded when he talked about the things which truly mattered to him. He also sounded like there was a distinctive part of him that wanted to punch Fenris, which was only fair since Fenris always wanted to punch him when he used that tone of voice on him. “That’s it? Out of every reason you have to run from _this_, it’s that you are ashamed to be seen with me?”

The rhythm of Fenris’s quick, sure steps faltered. He opened his mouth. He snapped it shut again. His fists tightened. He wanted to feel numb again, yet all he felt was anger boiling beneath his skin.

His pace picked up but that only brought him to his mansion even quicker and he had yet to lose Anders.

Standing in front of his door, he finally faced him again, hating that he had to look up to glare at him. At the back of his mind, he knew he should simply go inside and slam the door closed in Anders’s face yet here he stood, having trapped himself both in a face-off and between Anders and the door. “I’m not ashamed,” he declared boldly, though there was a bitter aftertaste to his words.

Was he really not? But no. It wasn’t like that. It wasn’t that he feared the scrutiny or judgment of his friends, he just feared…

He shook his head again mutely but of course, Anders had to choose today of all days to discover the power of silence and remained silent, too – expectantly waiting for some better explanation than a flat denial.

Yet a better explanation wouldn’t come to him and with each moment that passed, Anders’s expectation weighed heavier and felt more damning. Anders had always been an expert at condemnation in silent judgment, though he usually reserved it for matters he valued more than whatever this nameless thing between them was.

That was the real problem here, wasn’t it? Fenris licked his lips. It had been alright as long as it remained nameless. Before, he could have told Anders to come in; they would have curled up in front of the fire and he would have kissed away Anders’s sour mood. It didn’t have to be anything beyond what it was. Now?

Now, he didn’t have the words, and certainly not to invite Anders inside. The mere weight of it was enough to stifle him into silence.

As he remained silent, he could watch Anders’s shoulders slump degree by degree.

“Okay,” Anders finally said, sounding quiet and small and very defeated – sounding exactly like Fenris felt at that moment.

He opened his mouth to protest. It wasn’t right for Anders to give in so easily. It went against everything Fenris knew about him. He snapped his mouth shut. Maybe he just didn’t care enough to fight. After all, when Anders railed about his hopeless causes these were the causes that mattered to him.

Fenris watched him walk away, still not finding words to make him stay – not even the words within his own mind to admit to himself that he wanted him to stay.

It was different now.

By some miracle – he suspected it to be named Hawke – his friends didn’t bring up Anders or that evening at the Hanged Man yet he knew that they knew. He knew they were watching, were analyzing, that they were most certainly picking apart every movement he made as soon as he was out of earshot.

Him and the mage, it had to be the juiciest gossip they’d had in ages. Especially if they, as Merrill’s outburst implied, thought there was far more between them than there had ever been. A couple, she had called them.

Did they think now that he was a hypocrite? That every bitter barb about blood mages and abominations had been nothing but the saccharine bickering of lovers? That all their feuds, the hurt, the anger, the very real suspicion and the struggle it was every time he permitted Anders’s healing magic to wash over him, that all of that had been nothing but token protests to hide a torrid love affair?

Maybe, Fenris decided as he took another sip of wine and stared morosely into the fire, maybe Anders had been right. Maybe it really bothered him that their friends knew. Maybe, and he still didn’t think so, but who was he to contest it when Anders had been spot on already, maybe the real problem was indeed that he was ashamed to be seen with him.

He scoffed at the nearly empty bottle and drained it.

He didn’t like it, didn’t like what it would say about him if this accusation were true.

He still didn’t think it was right – he just didn’t have a better explanation to offer, he had no words for the unease he felt at giving a name to this thing between them.

He opened the bottle he had set aside to share with Anders. There was nothing left to save it for.

“You didn’t even like me.”

For a month, Hawke had been careful to keep them apart.

Then Aveline asked Fenris to help out with a nighttime patrol and it wasn’t until he got there that he saw Anders had been asked, too. He didn’t even know that Aveline and Anders got along well enough for him to do her favors that didn’t involve Hawke, it had to be some bizarre new development that had happened while he avoided Anders.

It could have been okay between Fenris taking the lead and Anders as mage staying back, except this was Anders they were talking about and expecting him to stay put and do what was expected of a mage had clearly been overly optimistic.

Fenris glared at him out of the corner of his eyes. “Shouldn’t you be with the guards?” he asked. He’d left the group of four city guards in his wake while Fenris scouted ahead. One man would be quieter by himself, had been his reasoning. So much for quiet, or for being alone.

“You’ve been avoiding me,” Anders continued, as if he hadn’t even heard Fenris’s rebuke. He looked worn out, thinner, with deeper shadows beneath his eyes but the determined way he held his staff told Fenris he meant business.

“You walked away, mage. Is your demon destroying your memory now?”

Anders snorted. “Very mature, Fenris.”

He gritted his teeth. That was rich, coming from him. It wasn’t like Anders didn’t start half their arguments and when Fenris started them, Anders had provoked it in some manner.

The alley they were taking took a turn, behind which it would open onto one of these backstreet courtyards which were popular places for ambushes.

Somewhere behind that bend, something rustled, then there were hurried footsteps.

Fenris slowed as they approached the bend, his attention now completely focused on his surroundings. He could sense the same shift in Anders, the mage falling back half a step so he wouldn’t get in the way of Fenris drawing his greatsword.

“Fenris,” he whispered, urgently.

“Later,” he said before he knew what he was saying. He regretted the promise the moment he made it.

A promise was a promise.

They stood in the bedroom Fenris had claimed for himself, Anders by the bookcase and Fenris by the fireplace, clutching a bottle of wine and cursing himself for whatever sense of fairness had driven him to keep his word.

Anders shouldn’t be back here, he thought, even as his eyes lingered on the golden-red hue Anders’s hair had in the firelight. Illuminated by more than just moonlight and the few streetlamps of Kirkwall’s backstreets, he looked even more ragged.

Justice must have been working him hard; Anders was always far too willing to bury himself in his hopeless causes when he tried to hide from his problems – Fenris hated himself a little for knowing this about his life. Even knowing that much, something any of Hawke’s group could have told him, felt far too intimate.

Anders leaned against the wall. He slumped against it, more like it. He had his hands folded in front of him and looked down at them now. “I don’t know where to go from here,” he said quietly.

“I don’t even know why you’re here.”

Anders’s face darkened. “Could you at least _try_?!” he spat.

Fenris stiffened in indignation, even as he felt overcome with relief. This was more like the man he knew. This was better than the eerily defeated man who had walked away the other night. “Why do you think you still have your heart, abomination?”

Anders made a disgusted noise. “So we’re back to that now? Name-calling and threats. I had almost forgotten how _charming_ you can be.”

Fenris exhaled noisily, forcing down the anger and the heated retorts. They could fight, yes, and it would be falling back into comfortingly familiar patterns. Except he didn’t want to. He could be that kind of person but he didn’t want to be. If only Anders could see that.

He put down the bottle of wine, his movements so carefully controlled and measured it felt downright comical to him.

“I reacted… badly.” He swallowed hard, choosing to study Anders’s ratty old boots instead of meeting his eyes. “That other night.” A moment passed, only the crackle of the fire breaking the silence. “But so did you.”

“I did,” Anders said after a moment of hesitation. “We weren’t at our best, were we?”

He sounded gentler now, he sounded exactly like the man who had shared so many peaceful evenings with Fenris. His heart ached with the reminder they could speak of these evenings in the past tense now.

Fenris ground his heel into the scuffed wooden flooring. “I’m not ashamed of you,” he ventured, though there remained a seed of doubt. He didn’t think he was ashamed. One of the best things about being free was that he could afford not to care anymore what others thought of him. If at all, then he feared that he would think less of himself. Which would, he could admit, be even more damning in Anders’s eyes.

Anders sighed. When Fenris’s eyes flickered up, he found him rubbing the stubble on his chin. He walked forward slowly, giving Fenris plenty of time before he had crossed the distance between them, yet Fenris didn’t budge and Anders seemed to take heart from this.

“I understand why you ran,” he said, and Fenris chose not to correct him with the even uglier truth. “It’s daunting that they know.” He shrugged. “It just didn’t hit me quite as hard as you. Maybe because I already had someone judging me all along.” He tapped his temple and flashed Fenris a crooked, almost sheepish little smile.

Fenris scowled. “Don’t remind me.” Justice was just one of the many things they didn’t speak of. One of the many things his friends would be questioning him about, wanting an explanation he wouldn’t be able to give.

“I know,” Anders said, giving him a pointed look.

Fenris averted his eyes again. “You’re handling this better than I thought.” Far better than he was, anyway.

“Not really. I just…” He reached up, tapping a finger against the underside of Fenris’s chin. “Would you look at me?”

He had asked but he hadn’t forced him to look at him. That alone was enough to make Fenris comply, though his gut crawled with nervousness.

Ever since _this_ started, he had liked having Anders’s brown eyes on him. Even when it was just while they were at the Hanged Man or following Hawke on some scheme, he had been warmed by Anders’s gaze where before his scrutiny had felt like bugs crawling over his skin. They weren’t overly affectionate, what they had wasn’t like that, but it felt like a caress when Anders’s eyes would find him time and again, as if Fenris was always on his mind even when he was occupied with other things.

Now, he still found himself warmed by Anders’s eyes on him. It would be easier if he weren’t.

“I’m not ashamed of you,” he offered again. This time, he forced himself to meet Anders’s eyes as he said it, forced himself to read the hurt in them. He wanted to look away again, so he gritted his teeth. “I just.” He gulped. “I like to keep my private affairs private.”

“And you don’t want them to…” Anders’s brows furrowed, his face going pinched. “They’re going to see every flaw.”

Fenris nodded sharply, quietly relieved that Anders didn’t need him to spell out this vague, fuzzy unease he still couldn’t put into proper words.

The knowledge that he would have no answers because they had avoided finding answers. The fears because he knew that what they had was mostly based on never speaking of the things they disagreed on and pretending until morning that these things didn’t exist. He hadn’t changed his mind and neither had Anders but they were both lonely and when they were together, they were less alone. With most people, Fenris just felt all the lonelier for being in their company but for all that Anders was broken in different ways, he never felt inadequate with him.

It had been good enough, as long as nobody scrutinized it. In the light of day, the little they had would look pathetic – and Fenris had never been able to endure pity well.

“I hate this,” Fenris ground out, for he didn’t have the words to explain all of this to Anders, least of all without mortally offending him in some way. They had never gotten any better at talking about the things that mattered.

“That makes two of us.” Anders’s eyes sparked and Fenris absolutely knew that he wanted to make some ill-advised jest of _three of us_ but he seemed to think better of it at the last moment.

Fenris narrowed his eyes at him, a silent warning that he knew exactly what he had almost done, and once more mischief sparked in Anders’s eyes. Fenris growled low in his throat, overcome by a surge of affection, predictably followed by his frustration at his own affection for the ridiculous man. Mage. He was still a mage, except right now that didn’t matter so much. It would matter in the morning but right now it paled in comparison to the way Anders’s gaze warmed him.

It was Fenris who first reached for him, leaning in to press his lips to Anders’s. Anders whimpered, sending little jolts of desire straight to Fenris’s groin. His lips parted for him and Fenris’s tongue snaked into his mouth, eager for that taste he had been missing for too long. Anders’s arms snaked around him, drawing him close without chaining him in that maddening way Fenris loved far more than he would ever admit. He buried his fingers in Anders’s golden hair and groaned when Anders pressed his body flush against him.

They took their sweet time tasting another, rediscovering what they had denied another for more than a month – what Fenris, at least, had thought forever lost.

Their first kiss led to a second, to a third. Anders’s hands slipped under his shirt and Fenris pushed the ragged feather coat from his shoulders.

He buried his face in the crook of Anders’s neck, nostrils flaring as he deeply inhaled his scent and memorized it. Anders’s fingers danced over his spine, skillfully avoiding his markings without even needing to look. When his tongue darted out, tasting his skin, Anders’s fingers dug into his back. Fenris arched into him. He nipped at his throat, bit a path up to the underside of his chin, then found his lips again. Anders met his kiss eagerly, hungrily.

“Stay.” Fenris’s voice was rough. Anders’s hands slid down, cupping his ass and drawing him close, grinding Fenris’s groin against his own and Fenris moaned and bucked, all too eager to give what Anders asked for. His breath was shaky and his hands equally so as he tugged at Anders’s clothes, impatient now. “Stay the night.”

Anders sharply sucked in a lungful of air, a shudder running through him and he made a soft, pained little noise at the back of his throat. For a moment, a panicked, terrifying moment Fenris thought it was too little, too late. He still forgot sometimes that he now had the power to hurt Anders. Then Anders kissed him, a kiss far less languid and hungrier than the ones they had shared before.

Fenris let his eyes flutter shut and gave himself wholly to the oblivion he found only in Anders.

He tried his hardest not to wonder if time was still running out for them.

Fenris laid propped up on his right elbow, watching Anders whose exhaustion had finally caught up to him. He laid on his side, facing Fenris, his face relaxed and peaceful in sleep. There was a foot of distance between them now, a distance Fenris knew from experience would be bridged over the course of the night.

It had taken months until the first time they had spent the night together, longer still until Fenris no longer felt unsettled by the prospect of falling asleep next to him – not knowing if he would wake up to Anders or to Justice, or if both prospects shouldn’t be equally unsettling to him. Such thoughts no longer bothered him.

They still didn’t speak of the nightmares that plagued them, both politely pretending ignorance. Like everything between them, their nights required a careful balancing act.

His fingers brushed over Anders’s tousled hair, barely daring to touch him for fear of waking him. It would be mortifying, even if it weren’t unwise to startle a mage.

Fenris wanted to believe their problems would be resolved now or at least eased, but in truth he couldn’t say if this night had changed anything.

Would they be back to blaming another tomorrow? Would this only add to their bitterness with another? He didn’t know.

All he could say for sure was, right now there was nowhere he would rather be than at Anders’s side. Tonight, Anders hadn’t run and neither had Fenris. For tonight, it would have to be enough that the ticking clock had been paused.

Everything else? Well, that would have to be a problem for the morning.


End file.
